It’s been a while, but finally we are back with another reasons to go to law school contender. Let’s remind everyone of the rules:

1. You need two reasons.

2. They must be good reasons (good enough to overcome the expenses).

3. They must be for going to law school.

So, without any further ado, here we go:

I’m a new reader of your blog, first reading your comments on bitter lawyer and then reading more from your own website, and after seeing the other responses I decided to state my two reasons for attending law school and let you see how they stack.

First I’ll say the weaker reason, which is that I believe from the basic information I’ve gathered about lawyers that I would be good as a litigator. I enjoy researching and formulating arguments to difficult issues as well as am comfortable preparing papers, or in the future briefs, for said arguments. I am a comfortable public speaker and generally persuasive in a factual as well as traditional communication sense (persuasion based on naturally unreasonable human responses such as emotional situations). I also am well adjusted to deadlines and finishing work as well as performing under pressure which from my understanding is of utmost importance for a litigator.

My second reason continues the first, I am genuinely interested in being a lawyer. My undergraduate degree was political science with a pre-law concentration. I spent a year out of school to pay a little back on my loans and thus establish some credit, which I had not done before undergrad. I also worked at the GA Department of Revenue so I could gain some, if only minor, experience. I plan on either going into the Judge Advocate General program with the Navy or a local District Attorney’s office after law school, preferably doing summer associate and externships with either during my 2L and 3L beforehand. After several years, most likely a minimum of 4 years, I plan to apply to be an Assistant US Attorney.

The main downside is the debt that I will be incurring and the general understanding that most government sector jobs don’t pay nearly as much as private sector jobs. I slacked off in some of my core classes and it dragged my GPA down so I did not receive a scholarship for my first upcoming year and I plan on attending a 3rd tier school, but for me the money (and debt I will be burdened with) are an expensive but acceptable loss in exchange for me learning the skills and gaining the ability to practice law. Also, since I plan on going into what is considered public interest careers, I will, if I haven’t paid off my debt beforehand, plan on taking advantage of new programs to clear federal loans after 10 years of public interest work.

So in finishing, my first reason is that I have what I believe to be the skill sets that traditionally fit a lawyer, and my second reason is that I plan on and desire to be a lawyer after graduating. I know these 2 reasons work in conjunction but they are my reasons for going to law school since, as many people say including yourself in previous blogs, law school only really prepares you to be a lawyer.

Mercer University School of Law

US News #127, $35,695/yr

I really hope I didn’t ever say law school only prepares you to be a lawyer. That would be false. It doesn’t even prepare you to be a lawyer. What it does is let you check off a very important box allowing you to sit for the bar exam, an exam law school doesn’t prepare you for. Law school does open the road to becoming a lawyer, but it hardly prepares you to be a lawyer. But, on to your reasons.

1. I’ll Be Good at It

Not the worst reason in the world. People are generally happier doing jobs that they are good at. Not that hard to understand that we’d rather excel than struggle. The trouble with using this as a reason for going to law school is that it’s very hard to predict what actually being a lawyer is like. When you look at what lawyers do and then compare it to your skillset, it’s easy to miss the mundane day-to-day tasks, and also easy to not comprehend the repetitive nature of it all. You’ll spend more time filing motions for a continuance as a right than you will research novel arguments.

But, assuming you are exactly as dull and mechanical as you portray yourself to be, I’ll count this as a reason for going to law school. It would be a very good reason if you were prescient, but since it’s impossible to anticipate how you’ll really enjoy law, we’ll give this a B- (the curve helped you out a bit here).

2. I Really Want to Be a Government Prosecutor

You plan on getting into JAG? AHAHAHAHAHAHA!

No, no, sorry, that was-AHAHHAHAHA!

Seriously, if there’s not already a uniform hanging in your closet, you have as good of odds of getting into JAG as you do getting a Supreme Court clerkship. Those are insanely competitive jobs. It’s also a pretty miserable job your first few years, being shipped around to different air force posts in random hick towns, helping soldiers on their way to Afghanistan prepare their wills, and occasionally prosecuting a PFC for possession of a controlled substance.

But, let’s look at your second choice of jobs, working for the local DA.

Ahahahahaha!

You’ll notice I didn’t laugh quite so loudly. This is a much easier job to get, but still very, very tough. Consider that you’re going to be competing against students from UGA and UA (tied at #35), Emory (#30), Vanderbilt (#16), UVA (#9), Knoxville (#56), Georgia State (#61), and a bunch of kids from lower ranked schools, like Cumberland (#127) and John Marshall (#140).

The legal market is going to be a very scary place for at least the next 5 years, and there’s a good chance it will never fully recover. That means you’re going to be competing against not just the kid from Atlanta who went to UVA and really wants to be a state prosecutor when he graduates, but also the kid from Atlanta who went to UVA hoping to get a job in big law, but is looking to the government as a backup.

If you were getting a very nice scholarship from a T-14, I’d think you’d actually have some decent reasons for going to law school, but the fact of the matter is Mercer is not going to help you fulfill your dreams. Fewer than half their students have a job lined up at graduation, any job.

At 9 months after graduation, only 14.5% of Mercer grads have any job with the government. Only 58.9% of grads have a full time law job. The numbers don’t lie, it’s simply a bad bet.

68 Responses to “Reasons to Go to Law School #15-16”

I just wanted to point out that my legal theory that all bank accounts are automatically joint and co-owned upon marraige would have saved Maria Shriver from this particular humiliation that she is now enduring.

You cannot get a government job below the top tier. Can’t. Won’t even get an interview. Hell, won’t even get a rejection letter. You’re not even close to being considered for being in the running.

That’s at tier 2. Tier 3…hm. They might actually send you a bill for wasting their time with your resume. You’re just annoying them by trying for the job.

You really need an honest picture of the job market. The #1 graduate of a tier 2 school can graduate without a job lined up. Puny state clerkships in the middle of nowhere that pay 30k won’t even do you the honor of telling you you’ve been rejected.

At a third-tier school, you have 0 chance of actually seeing the inside of a courtroom. You probably won’t get a job in the law at all. That JD on your resume will turn off employers in other fields, so you’re actually spending three years of your life to make yourself LESS attractive as an applicant. It happened to me – I applied for a decent job with potential to make 6 figures in 2 years, and the guy who interviewed me didn’t think I’d want to stick around for that kind of money…because no matter how hard you try to explain this to people, everyone not in the law thinks that lawyers are banking 150k fresh out of law school. If you’re applying for anything that makes less than that, people think you’ll leave right away for a job in the law OR you’re incredibly weird, possibly psychotic, because you’re applying for a 40k-per-year job when there are great law jobs you could be taking.

You can’t shake that stigma. Don’t, don’t, DON’T go to law school. It will ruin your life.

Reality: I don’t have access to all of the most recent figures so let’s just use BL1Y’s numbers as a benchmark. Let’s assume that, based off the fact there were 161 students in the 2009 1L class that some people dropped out. World News and Reports notes that there were a total 439 students in the school, possibly for 2009 or 2010. Assuming the numbers are a little off that’s about 270 students in the 2L and 3L by rounding down. Also let’s assume there were more 2Ls than 3Ls just based off increased enrollment over years so that would be close to 120 in the graduating class (since again I don’t have access to the exact number). So out of those 120, about 70 would have full time jobs in law based on the 58.9%, and even then that might be a little inflated so let’s round down to 60. Using the total graduates for the percentage there would be 17 working in the government. If we use the 60 for the students with jobs then there would be 8 working in the government. In some estimates, I’ve read that 65% of those with jobs at graduation work in the private sector. That would mean 39 of the 60 either didn’t even apply for government, public interest, or military jobs because they wanted the private sector to begin with, or they didn’t get jobs there because what Reality implies is that the government, even local government, is extremely selective, maybe even more selective in comparison to mid and small size firms. So 21 of the 60 people that had jobs ready right after graduating, found jobs in government, public interest, and the military. Government jobs are also the higher percentage of the 3, sitting at about 14.29%. Now I’m assuming that the numbers provided are based strictly on legal jobs and not just people that found some type of job after graduating, but if my assumption is correct that would mean that it doesn’t take being in the top 10% to find a job from a third tier school and that the public sector does in fact hire students from third tier schools. This all involves a lot of assumptions based of the validity of the data but with it I would suspect that more students are trying to find jobs in the private sector than in the public sector so the fact that the percentage of those graduates that had government jobs is low than the private sector does not correctly relate to a lower likelihood of getting those jobs. Also, the number 1 ranked students at a second tier school is just a student in the higher percentage and more of an outlier than a predictable statistic, especially since those schools would have a higher percentage of students with jobs at graduation anyway.

Well as I stated, there has to be some assumptions whenever you use data. Though you claim that the numbers put out by law schools are fabrications you also look to the US News and World Report’s rankings to determine what tier a school falls in and thus are in your own way validating the data because they base their ranks off of the data from schools and their own research. That is why I must start the analysis by accepting the data that the rankings accept. I also don’t ask you to believe anything because you have shown you don’t believe data that must logically be at least partially accurate. I just merely pointed out that you use hyperbole to describe the prospects of anyone below second tier when data shows that there are opportunities for students at any school, though much more difficult to achieve at lower tier schools. Just because you sound to have had bad experience in the legal market doesn’t mean no one can find a job. Remember, no school has 100% job placement at graduation. Though top tier schools help tremendously, there are unemployed students from every school.

There is only one reason for a guy to pursue higher education. To get a better babe. That babe, however, can only be really hot if she is not too educated. After all, you don’t want to have her reciting the Magna Charta with her legs in the air.

I’ll take the one reciting the Magna Carta…it won’t be Ellen or Alma that’s for sure. Or one in Banking: after listening to Not A Lawyer, I am going to add banking to my list. They must come with an overlay of logic or grounded insight that women in some other careers don’t have.

Dude, find a theatre major at a decent sized school like I went to. Not only do these women love drama, they keep their bodies tight and clean and the one’s I dated always wanted to screw like bunny rabbits.

If nothing more, if you land a few theatre majors, you’ll have to make sure andrest up between all of the afternoons you’ll have in bed with them. Also, since the one’s I dated wanted to break into the movies, they were anxious to leave for the west coast as soon as they graduated. This was fine, since the last thing I cared about was listening to their hopes and desires after about 6 months of listening and virtually non-stop loving. Don’t know where you live, but this arrangement worked out fine for me.

Alma, no man abides by the “if you like it then you should have put a ring on it”. We already have to deal with deadlines, we don’t want extra requirements before getting sex. If a women ever puts that out there I run like I’m being chased by natives who think I’m dinner. Second date is all I wait.

There is a new guy on the bitterlawyer.com website who also seems to think that women like us will just bend over for them just because they are law students! Can you imagine? Why would any girl want to let some guy pound on them just because they will someday get a JD degree? I have no idea who the women this guy is getting into bed, but it should stop right away!

Women, wake up and smell the coffee! It is alot better then some jerk’s crotch! No man’s weenie should get anywhere near our vulvas unless we are at least ENGAGED to them. Once we are married, we will at least have some security, but do NOT let a man near your vulva any earlier then you have to!

He’s talking to himself. I just can’t even pretend to think Alma is a girl any longer. I mean, how many times does a troll need to say vulva before they get bored? And if she’s real I’d just sit pointing and laughing at my computer.

She’s probably a chick with severely religous upbringings. I knew someone like this in college. Wouldn’t do a thing until after one day she got wasted and drunk. Once that happened, she was literally sucking everything in sight. No one dared bedding her though, because once she sobered up, she would have tracked down whoever it is who took her virginity.

Alma iss no good for any man, including my Guano Dubango. She is what you say, meexed up, and she don know what she wants.

She may be smart but she lika many American womeen, all messed up by feminists. She want a career, but she want to be maried an stay home; she wan a stong man but one she can control. Where I wasa born, she is type that want “toasted ice.”

Avoid woomeen lika Alma by go to san diego an finda a woman who major in engineering, economics, history, a real subject, but notta english, sociology or a psychology, or womeen’s studies. Dose types theenk they are smart butta dey are not. dey are messed up, living in world of fiction novels ana cannot tell difference between fiction an real life.

Da reel smart womeen stay away from dose subjects.

Alma, you may be a woomeen buta you no remember how to be one. Gloria Steinem, dat fraud on american womeen, she hasa messed you up.

I dig the typed accent Aunt ooona. It reminds me of that funny big-eared thing in Star Wars Episode 1. Why San Diego?

Hank, he hasn’t mentioned God, just his pristine vulva. I’m with S.O. – Alma/Ellen is a guy. I just wonder if he’s a straight guy with an “Alma” alter ego, complete with make-up and wardrobe, or a just effing around.

Who the heck is Aunt Ona and Guano Dubango anyway? I still think that Alma had a very strict upbringing and that is why she is so hung up on sex. If she’d post a picture, we can see if she is butt ugly.

Anyone who’s gone to law school? Have you been lurking in the hallways for the past 30 years just so people would remember you? NAL, I also suspect that Aunt Ooona is a Gungan from Star Wars I. I’ve always said Gungans were the Jamaicans of a galaxy far, far away. I bet alma is like Buffalo Bill and tucks it under while he tells people to put the lotion on the skin or else it gets the hose again.

Not A lawyer: I don look like a movie animal, but a proud, black woman who use to live near Fez in Morroco, where my husband had estates. When he die I sell the estates and move to US with Guano, who is grown now, but too nice an canno get a date to save hisa life. I tell heem nicea guys wait to long to ask women out an too long to maka move. Or they pant aftter womeen lika Alma who are more messed up as dey are.

Women from San Diego seema better grounded than from Los Angeles and new York. Dey jus more down to earth and don look atta man for his wallet. Dey also can joke and don get offended so easy.

I went to Universitait in Barcelona and lern spanish, and graduate with economic degree, and trade stocks, but I never pick up english so well, so indulge me. (My bankers like me because I l hava millions in the bank, a new S550, ana beeg house.)

I see men like my Guano panting after Alma on other sites and tell him she messed up and no good. A woman lika Alma, when she try to remember what day it is willa not be sure of the year either. I blame it all on US photo feminists lika Steinem who seema famous only for wearing a rabbit tail once in a Playboy club. Den, when Steinem’s magazine it go insolvent, she getta a rich man to bail her out. I respect women lika Cindy Crawford and even lady gaga for what dey do. You don’t see them leaning on men or bashing dem either.

Alma she not preserve morality: she wasta her youth that god gave her. She a fool and so is a man that prefers a dry, cracked river bed to one witha water.

Hank, she nota religious: mos religious women go crazy when dey get out in the world.

Mesa Aunt Ooona, Wesa go see Ani at da Bombad races cause mesa loves da rum rum. I agree with previous posters, I think Ellen and Alma might be the same guy, I could be wrong but as they say, “picture or it didn’t happen.”

Alma this site is like the woman who said “if you can’t say anything nice about people, come and sit next to me.”

In your case though, I may have to sit you and your vulva at the bottom of the long, well-polished massive oak table at the remote but luxurious manision where we’re all going to meet one day. I can’t have you ruining conversation. If you promise to let Hank put his hand on your thigh, and not talk too much, I’ll sit you next to him.

Ellen, you sound like you are a new attorney who may be vulnerable. Do not accept anything from men, as they are likely just trying to take you to bed with them. Afterward, they will toss you aside, leaving you unhappy. So guard yourself against getting hurt by resisting any desire you have for male-assisted orgasm.

True, Convertables are very “bankish”, but I’m wondering why you need a sample. Are you going to draft one, or are you evalauating one already in play? Clients are either purchasing or selling some group of secured assets, no?

And Ellen, we’ve missed your crazy! I’m from Dallas – I hope you noticed how much the women here are substantially hotter than other parts of the country. Did that throw you and your breasts for a loop? And how did you enjoy our weather? I’m surprised you travelled here through the 9 tornadoes we had last week and managed a flight, much less a low cut blouse. :) You really are spectacular!

I don’t want to speak for Ellen, but if I remember correctly, she works in a small law firm and most likely does not have access to precedent the way those in Big-Law do.

If her boss has her drafting such an agreement, she will need to model it after something and I never did a convert before.

As to whether she considers the babes in Dallas hot, that is up to her to say but I will tell you that if you find a good one to bone, make sure to give it your all, and you won’t regret it. I wound up marrying a hot chick from Fort Worth, and believe me, the 3 years of marriage I had with her was great, until she wound up cheating on me. I dumped her ass quick, notwithstanding the great sex, I did not want her once I found out she was humping other guys in our development.

The manageing partner wants me to draft this ANEW GREEMENT FROM SCRATECH, and I have NEVER done any kind of Note. I think he is trying to get me to fale, and I REFUSE to. I started to GOOGLE and found this one, but it is to specefic I think.

I tried to read your agreement and got bored, so I’d say just make sure the terms under which the stock can be converted are clearly defined. I’m not sire if you’re representing the investor or the firm raising the capital, but understand how convertibles can go wrong…..and use spell check.

Not A Lawyer, you are too much: someone who is likely a posturing fraud pretends to be doing real work in a low cut blouse, while billing for finding forms on google, and you’re trying to be helpful: I bet you were the one at college parties that made sure some of the kids that threw up got cleaned up and a ride home. what a gem.

Ellen, I am looking out for you: at the Huge (but comfortably appointed), Remote (but accessible) and Tasteful (but not overly done) mansion dinner, we will have a supply of regular blouses for you. If you don’t want larry or JP to help you take off the low cut one and put the new one on, (which may require a change of bra), my butler, Vulva or the Somilier, Marshmount will help you.

Alma, i will arrange to have some catherine McKinon speeches on DVD for you to watch in another room, but i also think you are incredibly easy after one drink, a left over issue about not enough attention from Dad. So if you are half way decent looking, there will be competition to get you first.

Who would ever put an associate who had never done a Note in charge of an agreement of this type?

In response to your question, Pig: I don’t know. I’m not a lawyer. I’ve been with a Wall St. firm for 4 years and they barely let me send emails….But, you hit the nail on the head. I am still that girl, unfortunately.

But why would he ask about convertibles unless he needed to know SOMETHING about them?

Not “unfortunately.” I think is so cool. Anyway, Karma is for real: time wounds all heels and its good to be good. Safer too.

I just don’t see anyone in a position to fly a lawyer to Dallas to do DD entrusting it to someone that always sounds like he/she/it is barely hitting the keys after downing a half bottle bottle of Grey Goose.

Asking an associate to draft an agreement from scratch? There must be 10 ways of getting a state of the art agreement from some big firm’s deal as a template.

I think if she/he/ is for real, some partner in a huge firm has set her aside as a client’s kid or mistress and is deliberately and desperately making work for her. One day the case will end and she’ll be gone. She’ll sue and it’ll hit the papers and we’ll finally learn who he/she is.

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